


Blank

by FrivolousSuits



Category: Suits (US TV)
Genre: F/F, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-05
Updated: 2018-06-05
Packaged: 2019-05-18 10:39:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14851194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrivolousSuits/pseuds/FrivolousSuits
Summary: When Rachel tells her about the engagement, Katrina receives the news with a pleasant smile. She is a master of her own emotions, and so she manages to express her congratulations and her genuine hopes for Rachel’s happiness without letting the pain bleed through.She just barely pulls it off.





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**Author's Note:**

> I was taking rareship ficlet requests on Tumblr for a bit, so here's another one of those fills!

When Rachel tells her about the engagement, Katrina receives the news with a pleasant smile. She is a master of her own emotions, and so she manages to express her congratulations and her genuine hopes for Rachel’s happiness without letting the pain bleed through.

She just barely pulls it off.

She watches Rachel leave and then returns to her work, methodically crafting a motion to dismiss a suit against her client. Her scorn for opposing counsel is only slightly more withering than usual.

* * *

She puts all her energy into choosing a gift for the happy couple; the process involves index cards, spreadsheets, and more hours than she can count in her kitchen, bent over a mixing bowl. She doubts there’s much that Rachel Zane needs in her life, so Katrina tries to identify what she _wants_. She wants pretty things. She wants to feel sophisticated and mildly spoiled. She wants to feel special.

Katrina’s heard Rachel complain time and time again about Mike’s inability to cook, so she orders a sous vide machine, top of the line– the rich man’s Vitamix, a contraption so foolproof that even Mike can cook edible meals with it, because Rachel deserves that much. She imagines Rachel curled up on a couch as Mike serves up fine five-course meals, Rachel bathed in firelight that glints on her curls, Rachel looking up at Mike with a loving, devoted smile–

Katrina shakes her head to erase the image.

Rachel deserves to feel special, because she is the most special woman Katrina’s ever had the privilege of knowing, and so Katrina spends all her free time in the next months trying to craft a second, decidedly unforgettable gift with her own two hands: cupcakes.

It sounds ridiculous, she knows, and it’s not something she’d dare give to anyone else. But she takes great pride in her baking, and she knows Rachel will appreciate the care lavished on her creations, so she contacts the best of her suppliers and stocks up on possible ingredients. She orders Kahlúa Especial and bags of rock candy, crème fraîche and uncrushed cocoa beans straight from Madagascar. She spends hours in her kitchen, trying recipe after recipe, calibrating the texture and flavor and presentation to optimize the chances of bringing a smile to Rachel’s face.

She’s at home one night, putting yet another trial batch of cupcakes in the oven; over the past few weeks she’s been converging on the perfect recipe, but she still has to tinker with the liqueur in the batter and practice decorating the tops with gold leaf filigree. That’s when Donna’s email comes through.

Mike and Rachel have rescheduled their wedding for tomorrow.

She groans, not least because she’s got a full day’s work tomorrow, even on a Saturday; such is the life of a corporate lawyer. She starts mentally reorganizing her schedule, trying to figure out how she can meet all her deadlines and still make it to the wedding. If she finishes the briefs in five hours instead of seven, if she gets up at 5:30 to call an overseas client while he’s still at his office in Beijing, if she stays up until one tonight prepping and packaging her cupcakes so they’re ready to present, she can make it to the wedding and be there for Rachel.

Half past midnight, she takes the cupcakes out and sets them on the rack to cool. She tries one and finds it moist and delicious and almost, almost worthy.

* * *

She’s spent five hours, and the briefs are nowhere near done.

Sighing, Katrina types up another meticulously phrased Boolean query on LexisNexis and prays for a useful result, when it strikes her that she might be better off missing the ceremony. Though she’s an excellent liar, it’s safer this way; she doesn’t relish the challenge of smiling through her tears while Rachel floats down the aisle.

Katrina redoubles her efforts and commits to making it to the second half of the reception, sous vide in one hand and cupcake box in the other, and she’s almost tempted to pick up First Ring tickets for the New York City Ballet on the way, just to apologize for her lateness.

She finds out from Harvey, when he knocks at her door just as she’s about to leave.

“What do you–” she stammers for a moment and then grabs her gifts, preparing to dash out. “What do you mean? They’re still at the reception at least, aren’t they?”

He shakes his head and tells her again. They’re gone. They’re off catching a red-eye to their new lives in Seattle.

He briskly moves on to describing all the cases that Katrina will have to take over now, and some still-functioning corner of her brain tracks the details and starts making plans, even as the rest of her mind goes blank. Then, with a strange blankness in his own eyes he leaves her to sink back into her chair, slowly, and realize she never got to say goodbye.

She tries to tell herself it’s safer this way.

Glancing down at the box in her lap, she remembers the cupcakes, and she tears the wrapping and plucks one out. Finding it oddly dry, she throws the whole box away and goes back to work.


End file.
